VISUAL TASTE – YOU’VE NEVER SEEN ICE CREAM LIKE THIS

We were baffled (in a good way) by Heizal Jia Xin’s work initially when we saw her images. We couldn’t really make out what it was until we read her explanation and concept. Till now, we’re still bewildered by how she has taken these images and we bet you’ve never seen ice cream interpreted like this before. We spoke to Heizal to find out more about the story behind these images.

If you could taste paradise, what would it taste like? Some say desserts are the closest. Let your eyes feast into paradise even if you can’t have it right now. Heizal Jia Xin

// A Piece of Paradise

Heizal Jia Xin: A Piece of Paradise is a series of photographs taken RAW and with only ice cream. There are no Photoshop wonders involved to keep things all natural. The colors are a result of the background play with different colored papers and lighting. There was a lot of trial and error to wait for the right moment when the ice-cream turns into the ideal form of a natural landscape and layering the papers and adjust the lighting to get the almost identical color tones of breath-taking sceneries seen in our skies.

Melona Waters

// Of Visual Taste

Heizal Jia Xin: It’s actually a very open-ended project that was to translate something ordinary, into something extraordinary. I saw extraordinary as giving a new light to things around us which we think are plain or nothing else more than it’s physical being. In dictionary terms, it means something out of the usual. At the point of time when I was working on the project, I was also into how one can interpret an intangible description into something visible or visual. Taste was one of them.

That was when I thought of paradise and its multiple meanings because paradise often describes heaven or a supreme state of blissfulness. As Singaporeans, I think we are really into food and more often than not we hear people say something tastes heavenly and such.

Mango Cloud

Mt. Cream

// Paradise = Ice Cream

Heizal Jia Xin: I settled with desserts and sweet treats as my selected subject to photograph because I got to know how people would most often succumb to desserts and more likely to associate the taste of happiness with desserts. But I narrowed down my subject to ice cream because ice cream is always readily available and anyone can grab that piece of “paradise” anytime. Like many would agree, you may not be able to be in paradise right now but ice cream is just the same.

Mt. Chocochip

Cornetto Peak

Cornetto Rock

// To Depend As Little As Possible on Photoshop

Heizal Jia Xin: As indulgent as it may appear, I was able to challenge myself to depend as little as possible on the camera and post production on Photoshop (For a photography base project) and I hope this point makes it to part of the message for this work as well.

I think giving yourself time to enjoy what you love is very important, to always remind yourself why you started out on this path, so I make sure I allocate myself time to draw or put out my ideas in my head. I have this long quote at my workspace:

” The arts are not a way to make a living. They are a very human way of making life more bearable. Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. ” – Kurt Vonnegut

Fact // Nothing about myself, really. But if people love my work and what I do, that would be enough.

Message // It doesn’t mean you’re not good if you’re not doing similar work. I think we’re too quick to want to blend in instead of finding our own way to stand out.